A Lady Never Lies by Juliana Gray Read Free Book Online

door, where the cold shock of spitting rain dashed away the last remnants of the spell between them.
    On the portico, as he reached for the door, she turned to him.
    “Mr. Burke, it occurs to me that . . .” She hesitated.
    “Yes?”
    Her hand, still resting on his arm, fell away to fist at her side. “Well, as I said, we’ve no secrets. But all the same, I’d be rather grateful if you forbear mentioning our presence here to . . . to any mutual acquaintance, back in England.”
    The inn was dark; the night was dark. He looked hard at her face but couldn’t read her expression. “Of course not, if you’d rather.”
    “Thank you.” She made a dry little laugh. “I should hate to have all London come galloping down to join us, after all.”
    He didn’t answer, only opened the door and allowed her through, to scamper up the stairs to the room he’d vacated for her.
    Thank God, Finn thought, as he settled into his meager room. Thank God he’d be leaving at daybreak for a remote castle hidden in the rugged Tuscan hills.
    Thank God he’d spend the next year far away from whatever corner of the world the maddening Lady Alexandra Morley planned to occupy.

THREE
    T he baggage would have to be unloaded, the driver told them, shaking his head in sorrow. There was no other way.
    “What does he mean,
no other way
?” demanded Alexandra. “It will take hours, to say nothing of the mud ruining all that beautiful leather.” She ran her eyes over the neat rows of trunks in the cart, covered with a thick sheet of the best sailcloth to ward off the lingering damp.
    “The mud’s the difficulty,” Abigail said. “He says it’s too”—she rubbed her first and middle fingers against her thumb, searching for a word—“too sticky, too heavy, for the horses to move. Unless the weight is removed from the back, of course.”
    “For the amount of money he’s charged us,” said Alexandra, “he ought to have been more careful. The road is perfectly dry on the other side. Or . . . or at least rather less muddy.” She knew she was being petulant and didn’t much care. She had drunk a little too much wine last night, which was not her usual habit, and her head felt as if several dancing elves were presently becoming sick between the folds of her gray matter.
    It was all that Mr. Burke’s fault, of course. He’d examined her from across the dinner table, silent and lion eyed, shoulders squared beneath the plain dark wool of his jacket. She’d felt his brain turn over her words, analyze her expressions, judge her character. It was impertinent! A mere scientific gentleman, no matter how celebrated. Irish, probably, with that name and that coloring and that outrageous self-assurance.
    And then to find her in the stables, inspecting his machine, when she’d been quite certain the inn was quiet and somnolent! Stupid, stupid, to go for a look. What had she hoped to gain from it? She put one gloved hand to her temple and rubbed furiously, as if that would erase the image of those long, blunt-tipped fingers cracking a walnut in half.
    “It was bound to happen,” said Lilibet, lowering herself onto a large rock and drawing Philip into her lap. “The road’s impossible; we were mad to have left the inn at all.” Her voice held just the faintest trace of annoyance.
    “Rubbish,” Alexandra snapped. “We’d be mad to linger in a public inn. No, we’ve got to reach that castle tonight, and the earlier the better. Come along, ladies.” She stepped toward the cart and gave the broad canvas cloth an angry jerk. It rippled along the lumps and ridges of the baggage but did not quite come loose. “Abigail, come along the other side of the cart and help me. At this rate we shan’t push off until midnight.” She said the last words loudly, so that even the Italian driver would understand her.
    “Oh, look!” Abigail said.
    Alexandra turned. Her sister stood tall and straight, looking down the pitted road behind them,